Venkaiah Naidu Calls Hindi The National Language: Why Do Our Politicians Keep Forgetting That India Has No National Language?

In the backdrop of increasing animosity in South India against what is perceived as “Hindi imposition” by the centre, Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu added fuel to the flames by branding Hindi as the national language, ignoring what the Constitution says and what Indian democracy stands for in the process.

Naidu, who is the Minister of Information and Broadcasting, spread the misinformation that Hindi is India’s national language and opined that learning English was changing the “mindset” of Indians.

One of the most believed lies of our time

India has no national language. Contrary to what Naidu and many others like him would want you to believe, Hindi is NOT the “rashtrabhasha” of India and India has NO “rashtrabhasha”. The courts have seconded this and any person who has even glanced at the Constitution would be aware of this.

It is important to note that this is not a difficult thing to grasp – least of all for Naidu, who holds a bachelor’s degree in law. It is one of the most trivial things about India but over the years this mundane fact has been corrupted by lies and propaganda – so much so that millions of Indians today profess that Hindi is the national language.

It is one of the most believed lies of our time.

The language issue has been a controversy in states in the South and North-east for decades.qph

What do the Constitution and the courts say?

The Constitution (in Article 343) clearly describes Hindi and English as the official languages of the country.

(An official language and a national language are not the same. An official language is one that is used by a government to conduct its daily business; a national language is one that holds a special status in a country and is subject to special treatment over other languages to propagate it over other languages.)

Furthermore, as the Gujarat High Court observed in 2010, millions of Indians believing Hindi to be the national language does not change the fact that it is not the national language.

Hindi does hold a special place in the Constitution despite not being the national language. According to Article 351, “It shall be the duty of the Union to promote the spread of the Hindi language, to develop it so that it may serve as a medium of expression for all the elements of the composite culture of India and to secure its enrichment by assimilating without interfering with its genius, the forms, style and expressions used in Hindustani and in the other languages of India specified in the Eighth Schedule.”

However, the government is also tasked with ensuring the development of 22 other languages. This is defined in the Eighth Schedule to the Indian Constitution, which contains a list of 22 scheduled languages. The government is charged with the responsibility of propagating these languages so that “they grow rapidly in richness and become effective means of communicating modern knowledge”.

To understand why India has no national language, it is important to go back to the years after independence when our leaders deliberated at length to ensure that our Constitution would be one that would work for all Indians.

What the Constituent Assembly decided on

During the Constituent Assembly debates, our Founding Fathers debated at length about what kind of country India should be. They debated on secularism, federalism, democracy, minority rights, etc.

However, the most controversial and extensively debated issue was that of language – should India have a national language and, if so, which language would that be?

This question divided the Constituent Assembly. An Assembly that peaceful debated on matters of religion and caste would descend into chaos when the issue of language was brought up. In fact, on 10 December 1946 – on of the earliest days of debate – freedom fighter and future MP RV Dhulekar began speaking in Hindustani (a mixture of Hindi and Urdu, and largely synonymous with Hindi). The Chairman reminded him that many members did not know the language.

This was Dhulekar’s notorious reply: “People who do not know Hindustani have no right to stay in India. People who are present in this House to fashion a Constitution for India and do not know Hindustani are not worthy to be members of this Assembly. They had better leave.”

Dhulekar’s statement caused an uproar in the Assembly. This would not be the last time that the Constituent Assembly would break rules of procedure and denigrate to bickering. The individuals who supported the concept of a national language included luminaries like Mohandas Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. However, lengthy debates in the Constituent Assembly changed the minds of many.

So divisive was the issue of language – and it dawned upon our leaders that India was too diverse, too complex to be defined by one language.

A delicate consensus was reached by the Constituent Assembly: Hindi in its Devanagari script would be the official language along with English for a period of 15 years. The Constitution came into being in 1950 and for fifteen years India managed a precarious policy of bilingualism.

But as time progressed and more measures to replace English with Hindi were implemented, fears grew over what the imposition of Hindi would do to Indian federalism.

To pacify the suspicions of non-Hindi-majority states, Prime Minister Nehru assured Parliamentarians in 1959 that there would be “no imposition” of Hindi.

In 1963, the Official Languages Act was passed to give legal teeth to Nehru’s assurances. The Act said that even past the fifteen-year deadline “the English language may … continue to be used in addition to Hindi”. Nehru’s death in 1964 led to the ascension of Lal Bahadur Shastri, who, along with cabinet ministers Morarji Desai and Gulzarilal Nanda, was a vocal supporter of Hindi being the sole official language. This alienated MPs from the South, who until then trusted Nehru to mediate and the Official Languages Act to extend the deadline, if not avoid Hindi imposition altogether.

In the 1960s, the South erupted over the issue of Hindi imposition.qph

When attempts were made by the centre to make Hindi the national language in 1964, non-Hindi-speaking states erupted in indignation. Protests raged across South India, with demonstrations turning particularly violent in Tamil Nadu.

Faced with increasing opposition, the centre backed down. The Official Languages Act was amended in 1967 to cement a “virtual indefinite policy of bilingualism”.

However, fears over Hindi imposition have not subsided. As the Supreme Court noted in Union of India v. Murasoli Maran (1976), extending the time for the usage of English language does not amount to abandonment of progress in the use of Hindi as the official language of the Union. This significant observation, along with a national political scene that has been dominated for decades by politicians from Hindi-majority states, have meant that fears over the centre pushing for Hindi to be made the national language have remained strong and relevant.

India has no national language and no amount of lies can change that

Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu’s comments are plain lies and are unfair to the non-Hindi-speaking population of India. He needs to clarify on his intentions and apologise immediately.

We can debate for hours over whether India should have a national language, but there is no debate over the fact that India does not national language.

According to 2001 Census figures, 45% of Indians speak or know Hindi. But just 25% of people in India have declared Hindi as their mother tongue. It goes against the spirit of federalism and arithmetic to impose one language on the remaining 55% (or 75%, depending on how you see it).

Countries according to the number of official languages. India is among the most linguistically diverse nations on earth.Twitter

Furthermore, and most importantly, there are a few things every Indian should know when it comes to the language debate:

India has no national language. Nowhere does the Constitution mention Hindi as the national language.

It’s perfectly fine to not have a national language. Australia, Germany, the US, and many other democracies don’t have a national language.

Defining yourself by a language doesn’t make much sense – it’s something you associate with because of birth, something you had nothing to do with.

You’re fully free to settle down in any state of your choice in India – the Constitution guarantees you that freedom.

And while it’s practical to learn the language of the state you live in, it is not compulsory. Just like it’s not compulsory for you to know Hindi no matter where you live in India.

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Know Why This Small Town In Tamil Nadu Is In The Guinness Book Of World Records

Did you know there is a town at the southern tip of India that can be called ‘Heaven on Earth’. Its people realise the importance of keeping the environment clean.

Madukkarai Panchayat in Coimbatore district, Tamil Nadu, is the cleanest place in India, owing to around 50 women who wake up every day to collect waste from each and every household in the town. At 6 AM, the women set out to work with their green jackets on, hands covered in gloves and caps adjusted perfectly on their heads. Every morning they line up for the roll call. These ‘Green Friends’ are part of the solid waste management program supported by ACC Cement – Madukkarai.

Madukkarai, a small town at the tip of the country, is in the Guinness Book of World Records for the largest recycling lesson in the world. With the help of around 50 women, who are now called ‘Green Friends’, and a simple, scalable model, this town is leading the way for efficient waste management. #SwachhBharat

While most of us find someone to put the blame on, Madukkarai decided to take control in their own hands. The town has 8,000 households and a population of 42,000. 82% of the homes hand over garbage to ‘Green Friends’ every day. 1,440 tonnes of garbage is collected annually from the town of 18 wards and 107 streets.

There is a lot that we can learn from Madukkarai. One of the most disturbing realities that we face, despite which part of the country we reside in, is the similar dirt everywhere – garbage piled up on roadside, drains clogged with plastic bags and dogs chewing on the leftover food we have callously thrown on the streets.

We keep our homes clean; make sure that the floors are mopped every day. But why do we not share the same sentiment for our surroundings? We hardly realize that the street outside our home is as much ours as is anybody else’s. We are the ones who use these roads every day to commute. Madukkarai realized this and the importance of a clean environment for our health and well-being.

Guinness Book of World Records for the largest recycling lesson in the world

‘Green Friends’ collect household wastes in eight different bins for wet waste, kitchen waste, plastic waste, etc. This is then disposed in large bins kept in several parts of the town. Trucks pick up this waste daily and take it to the resource recovery park where the garbage is recycled.

The treatment center segregates the different types of wastes. The kitchen waste is converted into fertilizers and given to farmers at extremely low prices to use in cultivation of their crops. The plastic waste is processed to be used in the construction of roads, and also at the large ACC factory where it is used as fuel at high temperatures which does not even cause pollution.

Due to the efforts of ‘Green Friends’, the citizens of Madukkarai, and the municipality, there has been a 60% reduction in landfill waste over the span of three years. There has also been a 50% reduction in the vehicle movement to the landfill sites, 85% of organic waste is converted successfully into vermin compost, ample reduction in the use of fossil fuels, reduction in greenhouse gas emission to 60%, and substantial decrease in the spread of malaria and dengue among the people. Furthermore, barren lands provided for compost yard have been successfully converted into fully functional organic compost yard and non-recyclable waste is used as an alternative energy source for the cement industry.

Madukkarai’s citizens have also become more environment-friendly, with 30% of the households segregating the organic-recyclable waste at home.

What we can learn

Madukkarai has paved the way to the sustainable development of our world. They have shown us that is not impossible to keep our environment clean. All we need is to inculcate in us a concern for mother Earth. It is commendable that ACC is supporting Madukkarai in its venture and helping it stay clean.

We, as citizens of other towns, cities, villages and states in India, have a lot to learn from Madukkarai. We too can have a healthier life if only we care enough and practice our civil duties proudly.